You can buy the book, too. It's about 200 pages and worth a read. Though it can be a tad difficult to plow through, but it's a great read nonetheless and will have you thinking about the state of modern art differently. :-)

Actually, this is exactly the way I see modern art. I point to the introduction of practical photography. Artists were no longer needed for realstic and naturalist art like portraiture and landscapes to show the beauty of the world. At that point artist started moving to the abstract , representational and impressionistic, and painting "feelings". I will definitely get this book. I love stuff like this.

Okay, we've just entered a whole new level of crazy. An IED exploded in Cetral Park today. A young gipuy was jumping off a large rock in the park right onto a iIED. The bomb blew his foot off. Of course the Mayor said it probably wasn't related to any kind of terrorist attack. Just a regular kind of unknown bomber in our midst. I am so comforted by this. I am sticking to the sidewalk...

Random Thought 2: I've been watching the Olympic trials and I have to say that something's been bothering me.

In several instances, where a particular racer realized that enough better racers were already in the race to take the team slots, they didn't bother participating.

This strikes me as the worst kind of attitude for an athlete to have. As an athlete, you look for the challenges! You want the best because you want your chance to beat the best. You don't quit just because the best show up. That's pathetic.

Bev, That I could understand. But that isn't what happened here. Some dropped out for injuries, some because they already qualified. But for several others, the announcers said that they had backed out when they realized that XXX and YYY (usually Phleps and Lochte) were in the race and that they couldn't win.

But notice something about these painters: They approached humanity (or horses) with a love for it. Cassatt approached those mothers with a love and tenderness that shows in the paintings and Franz Marc used horses to give us new ways to see the beauty within the world.

And when it came to showing the more depressing parts of life the Catholic Georges Roualt gave the prostitutes and sad clowns he painted their humanity while Van Gogh refused to wallow in the mental anguish he suffered and instead provided us with some of the most beautiful, and sometimes haunting, paintings in history.

As Roger Scruton says later in the documentary: "Art has the ability to redeem life by finding beauty even in the worst aspect of things."

The police declined to name the young men because nobody had shown up as of Sunday night to identify their bodies, but friends and relatives recognized photographs that were posted on a messaging app by the Islamic State, along with praise for the violence.

The men, all in their late teens or early 20s, were products of Bangladesh’s elite, several having attended one of the country’s top English-medium private schools as well as universities both in the country and abroad.

Among them was the son of a former city leader in the prime minister’s own Awami League, the governing party.

“That’s what we’re absolutely riveted by,” said Kazi Anis Ahmed, a writer and publisher of the daily newspaper The Dhaka Tribune. “That these kids from very affluent families with no material want can still be turned to this kind of ideology, motivated not just to the point of killing but also want to be killed.”

That children of the country’s upper classes appear to have joined militant Islamists in an act of such brutality highlighted the radicalization among the largely moderate Muslim population here, a process that has accelerated in recent years.

Anthony, why is this so surprising? Bin laden came from an extraordinarily wealthy Saudi family. Many of the terrorist have been educated professionals like an unusual amount of doctors. They have the means and air of worldliness to travel around the world in polite circles. Remember that the terrorists who perpetrated 9/11 were in pilot training schools in the US. You can't do that with an education.

I'm not surprised there are young terrorists from affluent families, I am surprised by the way they were spent. Anybody could have carried out that attack. But like I've noted before, a bunch of Amcits (many of them of Somali descent) have been killed abroad while murdering in the name of ISIS or All Queda.

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blitheand strong,The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves offwork,The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, thedeckhand singing on the steamboat deck,The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singingas he stands,The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in themorning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife atwork, or of the girl sewing or washing,Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of youngfellows, robust, friendly,Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

Rustbelt, This is becoming a thing out here too. And I don't mean people with bad habits. I'm talking flat out retarded: people making turns from the wrong lane, people backing up on main roads when they miss an exist, women (yeah, it's true) on their phones as their cars are weaving all over the roads, dudes (can't call them "men") with road rage issues. I had several times where people turned on their blinkers, slowed down and then blew straight through the intersection.

It's time to give up ticketing. We need to empower cops to just shoot these people dead.

Random Thought 3: The NFL put out an 8 episode series which follows the 2015 Arizona Cardinals. It's been fun and interesting.

The same people who are waging a war against the NFL while claiming to be media, are tearing this thing apart. On idiot wrote that it's nonsense to call this a documentary (which it isn't) because it only shows the good side of the NFL. Others are calling it a whitewash. They claim the NFL should be covering concussions, guys who get cut, guys who get arrested, etc.

How cynical and how stupid! Why should any organization put out a television program outing its own dirty laundry? And even if they did, I can tell you that these losers would not be satisfied. Hating the NFL has become an obsession for those people.

This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,Stand like Druids of old, with voices sad and prophetic,Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring oceanSpeaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.

This is the forest primeval; but where are the hearts that beneath itLeaped like the roe, when he hears in the woodland the voice of the huntsman?Where is the thatch-roofed village, the home of Acadian farmers,--Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the woodlands,Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflecting an image of heaven?Waste are those pleasant farms, and the farmers forever departed!Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts of OctoberSeize them, and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them far o’er the ocean.Naught but tradition remains of the beautiful village of Grand-Pré.

Ye who believe in affection that hopes, and endures, and is patient,Ye who believe in the beauty and strength of woman’s devotion,List to the mournful tradition still sung by the pines of the forest;List to a Tale of Love in Acadie, home of the happy.

In this case, it's actually a gaggle of the usual suspect sportswriters and bloggers who spin everything NFL into an "the NFL is evil and must be destroyed!" stance while claiming to love the game.

They can't write about a retirement without mentioning concussions. They can't write about quarterbacks without mentioning "black quarterbacks" and how racist the NFL is... ditto on coaching. NFL contracts are a scandal. The NFL does nothing to stop racists and rapist and wife beaters.... and how dare you punish these poor, poor athletes!!!

They want the highly popular Peyton Manning destroyed for a since-withdrawn allegation that he used HGH. They want the NFL destroyed for punishing detested Tom Brady. They want the NFL closed down for not punishing Ray Rice with castration... for punishing poor Ray Rice, for not employing an open gay player (who failed out of the CFL), for drafting college students, for not drafting college students, for telling college football players they might be able to become pros if they enter the draft, for taking money the military offered them, for returning money the military paid them, for trying to get public funding for stadiums, for "cynically" giving to charity, for selling products, etc.

It never ends for them. There is nothing the NFL can do that they can't spin into an outrage.